"She is my daughter-in-law, Mrs. Schmidt," she answered sharply.
Mrs. Schmidt said no more to Mrs. Willing, but to Mrs. Bannon and to Emmeline she continued to express her pity for Mrs. Willing. Emmeline made no consenting answer, but her heart was meanly pleased.
Now, lying in the old carriage, Emmeline dreamed. She had a favorite vision, in which she saw herself an army nurse, bringing comfort to hundreds of wounded Union soldiers. At the end of a long career she became engaged to a young Union general. Of course she realized that there was little chance of such dreams coming true. The war could hardly last until she was old enough to be engaged, or wise enough to be a nurse. Indeed, as a practical nurse, she had already failed. Long and irksome were the hours she spent by Sister Bertha's bed—that fact was plain even to the poor invalid herself.
It is impossible to tell to what length Emmeline's dreaming might not have gone this hot, sleepy afternoon. But Emmeline heard, or thought she heard, a sound, and to her, dreaming was far less interesting than doing. She sprang up, tossed back the long braids of her hair, and climbed down out of the carriage. Here she shook herself thoroughly awake, and thus prepared for active life, ran out into the hot sunshine.
Standing still in the garden, Emmeline cocked her head. She had been certain that she heard shouting. Gettysburg, which was near the border, had often prepared itself for the arrival of the enemy, but now almost all the inhabitants except Emmeline had relinquished that fear. Emmeline still expected a battle. She went out by the side of the house and looked up and down the street, which lay bare and hot and quiet. She could hear her mother's voice as she talked in a low tone to Bertha; across the street the Schmidt baby whimpered. Emmeline, who loved babies, often took charge of the Schmidt baby.
Emmeline listened for a long minute, but heard nothing more. She shook one braid to the front of her shoulder, braided it tighter, and shook it back; then she examined the other, which proved to be still securely fastened.
Emmeline had long, thick hair and sparkling eyes. Her dress of blue and white striped calico was made with a skirt as full as a ruffle; her active legs were clothed in pantalets to match her dress; her arms and neck were bare, according to the fashion of '63. Having smoothed down her dress, Emmeline sauntered across the street, and went to the kitchen door of the Schmidt house. She realized uneasily that Bertha was crying and that her mother was trying to comfort her.
"I'll take the baby down the street, Mrs. Schmidt," Emmeline offered. "I have to go to the store."
"Thanks to you," answered Mrs. Schmidt, whose dinner dishes were still on the table. "With these six, indeed, I don't know what to do, Emmy."
Emmeline took the baby with the condescending air of perfect capability to perfect incapability. She would never, she said to herself, suffer her house or her children to get into the condition in which Mrs. Schmidt's house and children were. When she had washed the baby's face and smoothed his hair, he stopped crying at once, and with a beaming smile settled himself into his little cart. Then, with "Get ups!" and with prancings, Emmeline took him through the gate and down the quiet street. At the corner she stopped to look up the hill toward the seminary building and out toward the college. Now that the boys had formed a company and had gone to war, the town and Emmeline were denied even the excitement of their presence.